Posts Tagged ‘Biodiversity’

The WetlandLIFE Research Team are looking for artists whose work can contribute to our knowledge and appreciation of wetlands and mosquitoes. By this we mean artworks, in any medium, that seek to influence our awareness, understanding, attitudes, emotions, values or behaviour towards them, and the ecological and social interactions that have brought them into being. This might be done by communicating the findings of researchers about wetlands and mosquitoes to new audiences, challenging how we think about them, or changing how we feel about them – perhaps helping us connect with them in new ways.

This is an exciting opportunity for artists to work alongside local communities and a diverse team of environmental researchers to show how art can influence how we value nature and ecosystem services. The focus of work will be on the Somerset Levels, Humber Levels and Thames Estuary, although reference will also be made to a broad range of inland and marine wetlands across England to capture the diversity of these places.

We are offering three bursaries of £5,000 each (total of £15,000). Artists can apply for the total amount – and create work that relates to the project’s three case study sites or to wetlands in general – or for one bursary worth £5000 – perhaps focusing specifically on one of the sites. We welcome applications from consortiums of artists working together to address all three sites. The bursaries cover the artist(s) fees, accommodation and travel, and all costs associated with the production and display of the artworks.

Artworks by the successful artist/s will be included in a final touring exhibition, planned in early/mid 2019, which will visit each of the three case study sites.

Like this:

ASCI (Art Science Collaborations Inc) is currently calling for works for an exhibition in the New York Hall of Science (deadline 23 August 2015). ASCI has involved two really interesting jurors – Elizabeth Corr from the Natural Resources Defence Council and Paula J Ehrlich from the E.O.Wilson Biodiversity Foundation. The exhibition announcement highlights key themes and issues,

The Paleolithic cave paintings at Lascaux, France are a magnificent record of early man’s portrayal of the biodiversity of his surroundings. Artists have continued this long tradition, finding endless inspiration from the shape, color, pattern, texture, movement, and sounds of our natural world to create art in all expressive media. Taking the example of birds: Leonardo keenly observed and drew the flight pattern of birds in an attempt to invent a flying machine; Alfred Hitchcock used bird sounds as a psychological metaphor in his film, The Birds; Audubon’s self-published opus, Birds of America, proved his dual genius as a naturalist and artist; and a growing number of contemporary artworks are being created in reaction to avian species extinction, such as Rachel Berwick’s “may-por-é,” “Zugunruhe,” and “A Vanishing: Martha” installations.

Today we are learning the importance of the conservation of Earth’s biodiversity for more than its innate beauty, capacity to inspire art, and to lift our spirits. It is acknowledged by scientists and even governments around the world, as the key indicator of the health of our planet’s ecosystems. And, a rich biodiversity underpins ecosystem “services” (such as recycling of nutrients, purifying water, removing carbon dioxide and adding oxygen to our atmosphere, and sustaining habitat for animals and organisms like trees, and seeds that produce food), that are essential for human sustainability on our beautiful planet.

In his 1998 book, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, the esteemed Harvard biologist who coined the term “biodiversity,” E.O. Wilson, argues for a return to the ideals of the original Enlightenment, including the bridging of the sciences and humanities. It is in this spirit that Art & Science Collaborations is organizing the “SCIENCE INSPIRES ART: Biodiversity/Extinction” exhibition at the New York Hall of Science. We hope to demonstrate the wide diversity of visual tropes that today’s artists are employing to reflect upon the crisis of biodiversity loss and species extinction. We are seeking images of original art executed in any media for this international show.

Further information including guidance on submissions is on the ASCI page.

33 dagar/33 Days is an exhibition by Ingrid Book and Carina Hedén, and an investigation into the life of insects existing in a habitat of Damson trees (Prunus Insititia). The first Scandinavian findings of Damson, the “poor man’s plums”, are from the Viking age. The thicket measures 26 x 13 meters and is situated a few hundred meters from Grimeton Radio Station, on the west coast of Sweden. It’s a large-scale radio station for long wave transmissions and wireless telegraphy with the US from the 1920s. The Grimeton Radio Station of Halland is included in UNESCO’s World Heritage list.

The Damson thicket is surrounded by an agricultural landscape with monoculture. It’s a fragment of an old cultural landscape and represents an endangered biological heritage. The insects have been filmed in high resolution (4K), with a camera that “sees” more than the human eye and that reveals a “new” visual reality. Vegetation observed from the inside with the ultrafast reactions of the insects versus standstill and slow-moving time.

A diary of the unexpected behaviour of insects and their encounters (with man and his machines as an alien element) – during a rapidly proceeding summer.

Another work, “DRIFT, what about Callisto?”, questions the usage of pesticides in today’s industrial agriculture.

Ingrid Book and Carina Hedén are two artists based in Oslo. In their work – photography, video and installations – they actualize ethical and social questions in the intersections of architecture and urban and regional landscapes. Exhibitions of their work include Midlertidige utopier/Temporary Utopias for the Norwegian Democracy Investigation (Museet for Samtidskunst, Oslo 2003), News from the Field about urban agriculture (Bienale de São Paulo 2004), Militære landskap/Military Landscapes (Festspillutstillingen in Bergen, 2008). They participated in the Moderna Show 2010 with the series of photos Bexells Stenar, ett undangömt monument (Bexell’s Stones, a hidden monument).

The exhibition 33 dagar/33 Days also marks the end of our two-year long exhibition/investigation Sustainability – What Do We Actually mean?*, initiated by the Konsthall C work group in January 2013.

In connection with the opening of the exhibition, Thomas Bøhn, researcher/professor in gene ecology at the University of Tromsø, gave a lecture.

About Thomas Bøhn: “My research interests are focused on the effects of modern biotechnology, and in particularly of genetically modified orgamisms (GMO), on experimental model systems and on real food-webs. At my institution GenØk I’m particularly interested in risk assessment and effect studies of modern biotechnological products. One focus has been on the food quality and ecotoxicology of GM-plants (for example Bt-corn or Roundup Ready soy) in a feeding model with water fleas (Daphnia magna), also in combination with chemical stress factors (herbicides and other chemical pollutants). In the field, I work with the consequences of modern biotechnology on biological diversity and food-webs, both in terrestrial and aquatic systems. I also have a great interest in evolution, biodiversity, ecological interactions and invasion biology.”